1. Went to SF for the weekend. Took Friday off from Smartbomb and flew out Thursday night. It was wonderful to spend some time with Lisa and enjoy the 78 degree Northern CA weather. Ah, le sigh. She took me to her climbing gym...as always a delight to watch her scale things like the nimble monkey she is and then she took me to this raw vegan restaurant. I was more than a little dubious as I walked in...and was even more so when the menu has items called "I am Wonderful," ...which was like this salad that they called lasagna...and you had to actually ORDER it like that. You couldn't say "I'll have the lasagna," you had to say, "I AM WONDERFUL." And then they would smile passively at you and say, "Yes, you ARE."So, hippy dippy patchouli smelling but the food was really quite wonderful. I quipped as I walked out, "I AM PLEASANTLY SURPRISED!" and "I AM STUFFED!" They would look at me with the same half lidded look and say, "Yes. You ARE."

2. Friday I walked around Market. I stopped at a few banks searching for the George Washington dollar coins without any success. I wore my converse and about halfway into my journey, realized that I don't actually WALK around a lot in them. I was limping rather hard by the time I got home and had two enormous blisters on my achielles tendon and a bad one on my right pinky toe. It was bad enough that Saturday we stopped at this sports surplus store by the Bay Bridge and got me a pair of sandals to wear.

3. Saturday afternoon we ventured into Chinatown. This was some crazy go nuts big fun with minute long strings of firecrackers being lit and the markets crowded and people cheering back and forth, "Happy New Year!" I got me a new pair of pajamas and a jade necklade. The old man who sold us the necklaces was very cute. "For you, velly lucky! No tax! Happy New Yeah!" A guy, that cute, how could I not buy me a necklace? :)

4. Riding the bus was fun. Made me wish I'd had a sketchbook with me. SOOOO many interesting faces. It made me think of gigissand his former daily commute into SF. Also made me wish I could live there just doing freelance work. Workin' on it.

5. Sunday I accompanied Lisa to her church service. We got there 2 hours early...(well, almost.) so she could practice with her choir. I sat in the back, wrote on my laptop a little and then read a bit more into Fowler's Stages of Faith.The sermon was really interesting. There was a reading done talking about the transfiguration and Elijah and Moses ministering to Jesus and how the apostles must've felt after that "mountaintop moment."I thought about my last really strong definitive "mountaintop moment," ... the last time I felt really close and connected and drawn near to God...and found myself tearing up realizing just how long it had been since I had felt that close to God...very nearly a year and a half. I was kneeling and meditating on Mt. Tam, grateful for...the impossible miracles in my life.

I thought about things after that incredible "Mountaintop Moment," ...decisions I had made, the way other events played out. I thought about all my crushing doubts and crumbling faith. I thought about my anger, my frustrations...Sitting there though, in this congregation of strangers, in this service that was decidedly NOT my religious tradition I felt myself reaching out for God...hungering for Him and finding His presence. I felt myself thwacked on the forehead a little bit...a reminder to me that yes, He was read...that He was there to comfort me and I needed to seek him out.

7. I doodled cariacatures of the staff at this little Italian restaurant we ate at and left them as part of the tip. They loved them. :)

8. The roommates BATHED Beowulf while I was gone. This annoys me. I feel like if someone had spanked my kid while I was gone. Um...you did WHAT to my cat? Could you not have called first asking me if you could bathe him after explaining the situation. You couldn't have waited a few days until I got home to assess my cat?

He was more than happy to see me when I got home though. He is cuddled up next to me purring his mighty heart out.

Comments

I absolutely do not miss the commute... but I have to admit to feeling wistful about wandering around the City sometimes. I do miss that, but taking a day off to walk around and explore just isn't in the cards. Yet.

Why on earth did they bathe the cat?!? Did he get covered in some foul gunk or something, because that's the only reason you should have to bath a cat. Unless Beowulf is one of those cats who've never learned to wash themselves and he doesn't look like that to me.